UK Government Releases Shale Report Pointing Out Short-term Benefits vs Longer-term Effects

The UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs wrote in an “early draft” released on Wednesday that shale gas will have both positive and negative impacts on different groups within rural communities close to developments.

Among the positive impacts, the draft document named jobs, services, and energy. Among the negative repercussions, it named traffic congestion, prices of house in close proximity to the drilling operations, and noise. It also said that water resources, air quality and landscape will suffer ‘low impacts’.

‘It is estimated that there will be approximately 14 to 51 vehicle movements to a site each day during exploration and site preparation over a 32 to 145 week period. This could have an adverse impact on traffic congestion, noise or air quality depending on existing roads, traffic and air quality. It could have a more sustained and locally significant effect on communities adjacent to the development sites, or adjacent to the routes to the sites, during exploration and site preparation’ reads the section presenting findings from the existing literature.  

On the other hand, the report also presented the report commissioned by Cuadrilla to Regneris consultants, underlining positive repercussions in terms of jobs. 

‘Regeneris estimate the test well activity will support some 250 FTE jobs over a 12 month period across the UK. Half of the jobs will occur within Cuadrilla and its extensive range of 1st tier suppliers. Over a tenth of the jobs result from the expenditure patterns of employees across the wider UK economy. Just over 15% of the jobs (circa 40) are estimated to be taken by Lancashire residents’ the report wrote, speaking about the first year of operations. 

In conclusion, the analysis recommended to pay close attention to monitoring systems, and water practices. It also called for regulators’ scrutiny of risk assessment, asking for mandatory Environmental Risk Assessment. 

‘An Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA) should be mandatory for all shale gas operations. Risks should be assessed across the entire lifecycle of shale gas extraction, including risks associated with the disposal of wastes and abandonment of wells. Seismic risks should also feature as part of the ERA’ the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs wrote, adding that the short-term benefits should be compared to longer-term effects.

‘Although many rural communities may therefore gain in the short-term from the expansion of shale gas activity it is also important to consider the longer-term effect as companies exit the market. This will have implications for the potential benefits, costs, job creation and longer term economic development prospects for rural communities where shale gas drilling is taking place.’